Had a great 4th of July Weekend, great weather, food and friends. Sonoma on Friday was gorgeous and a nice escape from the cloudy city. Unlike Napa, Sonoma is a real town with a historic city center that was packed for the 4th. We still found time to hit up The Sonoma Cheese Factory, notorious for its tri-tip and burgers with exotic cheeses (I had mine with garlic cheese). Then we went to Benzinger, Ravenswood (where wimpy wines are not allowed) and Valley of the Moon. Benzinger was the best of the three as every wine we had there was delicious, especially the Cabernet Sauvignon. Valley of the Moon was nice because the tastings were free and they had some lighter/Chianti-like red wines. But only Benzinger’s worth the repeat visit.
NOTE: Ravenswood wines are available at Safeway really cheaply. They specialize in Zinfandel (not the white kind), probably worth trying a bottle of it.
Some pictures to flesh out my experience:
Burger at the Sonoma Cheese Factory
Another one:
Benzinger
- Ravenswood–where the wine is not wimpy
Sadly, the weather in SF was very very foggy and the clouds blocked our view of the fireworks. We did get a few glimpses and noted how the fireworks lit up the sky in a number of assorted colors. Most picturesque was an American flag (probably around Ft. Mason) waving furiously in the face of the fireworks–it felt as if it was withstanding bombing (sitting on my friend’s rooftop and hearing three sets of fireworks led us to believe we were under siege).
PS A good read in today’s times–Frank Rich comparing presidential election with the movie Wall-E (which I have not seen yet).
